Canadian clarinet player wins $260K against ex girlfriend who faked rejection letter

Pictured, Eric Abramovitz Canadian clarinet player and his former girlfriend, Jennifer Lee.

Pictured, Eric Abramovitz Canadian clarinet player and his former girlfriend, Jennifer Lee.

Eric Abramovitz a Canadian clarinet player and former McGill student wins $260K against ex girlfriend, Jennifer Lee- who faked rejection letter and nearly sabotaged his career.

A top clarinet player from Montreal, Canadanearly had his career sabotaged after the then 20 year old McGill student applied to study with a top elite school, be accepted in front of hundreds of applicants only for his then musician girlfriend sending email correspondence under a fake account passing up the offer.

The incident while not caught out at the time, eventually led toEric Abramovitz some years later realizing after chance meetings and discussions that he’d been duped out of the scholarship and a fast track as a top symphony player.

In turn Abramovitz who nevertheless, likely because of his sheer will, determination, discipline and talent had already attained dizzy success elected to launch a lawsuit against his ex girlfriend who nearly ruined his career and in the process being awarded by a Canadian court, $350K Canadian dollars– equivalent to $260K USD.

It all began in late 2013 when Eric Abramovitz applied for a two year scholarship to complete his bachelor’s degree at the Colburn Conservatory of Music in Los Angeles. At stake was a scholarship worth $50K which include tuition, board, money for meals and most importantly studying underneath Yehuda Gilad, one of the top clarinet players in the world.

Gilad who only accepts two students a year decided to offer Abramovitz one of the two slots after the promising student went to Los Angeles in 2014 and live audition and mesmerize the master teacher.

A month later, Gilad sent a letter to Abramovitz to say he was accepted, in essence ensuring the aspiring musician a high paying symphony career.

Eric Abramovitz aspiring clarinet genius: ‘Why did you reject me?’

Except here is where matters became undone according to a recent court case involving Abramovitz and his then girlfriend, Jennifer Lee, who as it turns out pretended to be her boyfriend and via intricate electronic inferences rejected the offer. During trial deliberations the woman according to the montrealgazzette said she feared losing her boyfriend.

Fearing Abramovitz would almost certainly move away, Lee who also happened to be a fellow McGill music student, after having become aware of the offer before her boyfriend , responded while pretending to be him that he would be elsewhere.

From there, Lee pretending to be Yehuda Gilad created a new email address informing Abramovitz he’d been rejected. Using the email account, giladyehuda09@gmail.com, Lee informed Abramovitz while he’d been rejected from the full scholarship he had secured a spot with the University of Southern California which was offering a scholarship of $5K a year, a far cry from the annual cost of tuition of $51K a year which Lee knew Abromovitz would have to reject cause he could never hope to afford it.

Believing he had in fact not been accepted, Abromovitz instead chose to complete his studies at McGill before doing a two-year certificate program at USC, not on scholarship, where he got to study part-time under Gilad.

It was during Abromovitz’s second audition with Gilad that the teacher asked the student, ‘Why did you reject me?’

In turn, the shocked Abromovitz asked, ‘Why did you reject me?’

Eric Abramovitz loss of a chance:

Some time later, the student forwarded Gilad’s rejection letter to the teacher only for the maestro to respond he’d never seen the email before.

Reported the montrealgazette: “That’s when I knew that something underhanded was afoot,” Abramovitz said. One day in 2015, he and a friend set about trying to gain access to the fake email account, and because Abramovitz and Lee once shared a computer, he knew one of her passwords, which he tried.

“Miraculously, it logged right in,” he said. Her email was listed as the recovery email, her phone was the recovery phone. “We felt like Sherlock Holmes.”

After Abramovitz learned of the deception, he sued for $300,000 in general damages, including for loss of reputation, loss of educational opportunity and loss of two years of income potential.

Wrote the presiding justice in part in their decision, ‘Imagine how Mr Abramovitz’s life would have been different if he had studied for two years under Mr. Gilad, and earned his teacher’s respect and support, requires more speculation than the law permits. One hears … of the ‘big breaks’ that can launch a promising artist to a stratospheric career.

‘I cannot speculate as to how high and how quickly Mr. Abramovitz’s career might have soared, but for the interference by Ms. Lee. But the law does recognize that the loss of a chance is a very real and compensable loss.’

Scammed clarinetist Eric Abramovitz says despite his ex-girlfriend’s betrayal, he’s happy he still got to work with teacher Yehuda Gilad in the end pic.twitter.com/l82uCuQEQp

Eric Abramovitz succeeding in spite of all his setbacks…

Based on testimony from Gilad, who noted that Abramovitz won numerous competitions in his first five months in Los Angeles and secured a position in the Santa Barbara Orchestra, Justice Corbett agreed he had lost out on two years of potential salary because of his girlfriend’s deceit, worth $71,500 U.S. a year.

Of note, Abrmovitz’s ex girlfriend never responded to the statement of claim against her, never filed a notice of intent to defend or a statement of defense, and thus was noted in default.

Despite his win in the courts, Abromovitz conceded that he would in all likelihood never collect his damages, as he does not know where Lee is with the woman blocking him on social media.